Halloween Night Service

Happy Halloween! We'll be having our service at the normal time tonight (7pm) in the Renfro basement. Wear your costume to the meeting and afterwards we'll be heading over to Spoon's house for the Halloween party. Mary is bringing some pumpkins to carve and everyone else is welcome to bring their favorite candy/food to munch on.


If you have questions contact us!

Sermon Jams

Have you ever wondered what Alistair Begg, Joshua Harris, John Piper, Driscoll, Ravi and others sound like to music? Well now there is no need to wonder.

10:31 Sermon Jams has put together sermon excerpts from all of those guys and put them to music. Relevant revolution also has some as well.

Alistair Begg is quickly becoming one of the pastors I love to listen to and learn from. I think it is a combination of his accent, humor, frankness, theological clarity, and his sense of urgency and seriousness when it comes to the Gospel. It kind of stinks that he comes on the radio in Charlotte when everybody is supposed to be in the bed.

Here are some notable sermon jams to check out:
Alistair Begg - Careful
Mark Driscoll - Idols
John Piper - Check Yourself
Josh Harris - Cross Centered
Ravi - Pride

ESV Reformation Study Bible

You might have heard us mentioning the ESV translation or noticed that we've been teaching from it a fair amount over the past couple months. If you've been wanting to buy a new Bible or wanting to check out the ESV you might want to take advantage of the sale happening on Wednesday for the ESV Reformation Study Bible. Order Here. (Only on Wednesday- Not
Before or After) This study Bible is edited by R.C. Sproul and the ESV is endorsed by John Piper and so, by my calculations, that would make this a pretty trustworthy Bible to have. Check it out if you are interested.

Dose of Spurgeon

'Salvation is of the Lord.'-Jonah 2:9

Salvation is the work of God. It is He alone who quickens the soul 'dead in trespasses and sins,' and it is He also who maintains the soul in its spiritual life. He is both 'Alpha and Omega.' 'Salvation is of the Lord.' If I am prayerful, God makes me prayerful; if I have graces, they are God's gifts to me; if I hold on in a consistent life, it is because He upholds me with His hand. I do nothing whatever towards my own preservation, except what God Himself first does in me. Whatever I have, all my goodness is of the Lord alone. Wherein I sin, that is my own; but wherein I act rightly, that is of God, wholly and completely. If I have repulsed a spiritual enemy, the Lord's strength nerved my arm. Do I live before men a consecrated life? It is not I, but Christ who liveth in me. Am I sanctified? I did not cleanse myself: God's Holy Spirit sanctifies me. Am I weaned from the world? I am weaned by God's chastisements sanctified to my good. Do I grow in knowledge? The great Instructor teaches me.

All my jewels were fashioned by heavenly art. I find in God all that I want; but I find in myself nothing but sin and misery. 'He only is my rock and my salvation.' Do I feed on the Word? That Word would be no food for me unless the Lord made it food for my soul, and helped me to feed upon it. Do I live on the manna which comes down from heaven? What is that manna but Jesus Christ himself incarnate, whose body and whose blood I eat and drink? Am I continually receiving fresh increase of strength? Where do I gather my might? My help cometh from heaven's hills: without Jesus I can do nothing. As a branch cannot bring forth fruit except it abide in the vine, no more can I, except I abide in Him. What Jonah learned in the great deep, let me learn this morning in my closet: 'Salvation is of the Lord.'

Poor Boy's Cookbook

Because I don't already have enough things to do--I decided to take on the task of creating a new blog. Unlike this blog, the new blog will will have nothing to do with ministry and everything to do with food. Sound strange? Why would he do that, you might ask? Well now that I've bought a house and have a culinary genius living with me, one could not help but create great food.

So please welcome to the blogosphere the Poor Boy's Cookbook. Just as a taste of what the new blog will offer, here is a quote from the first post:

"This blog will serve as a culinary platform to share with mankind the genius that is found within the minds of one Lazy Man and one School Teacher. They are two bachelors in their 20's sharing a home together and have no money. The School Teacher makes dimes and nickels working for the school system but loses all of his hard earned money to "the man" and to the mortgage company since they own his newly purchased home. The Lazy Man is a professional college student with no job, but a strong passion for cooking and the creative mind to fuel that passion."

I hope you'll check the blog out from time to time(you'll find a link in the side menu of this blog) as we will be posting up a variety of recipes that we create as well as various other cooking/food related posts. All of the recipes on the blog will be original recipes from our kitchen and most of them will come from our culinary experiments. Each post will contain a recipe card that can be enlarged and printed for your use. These recipes are taste tested and Wesson approved, and as you know if it's approved by a Wesson then it will taste pretty darn good. Not to mention, if its made by two bachelors then you know its gonna be cheap and quick to prepare. So please share and enjoy!

Poor Boy's Cookbook

Ephesisans Series Notes- Updated

Just uploaded notes from the Ephesians Series and they can be found in our wonderful new friend called The Box Widget. Click on the file you'd like to download below in the widget or you can just view our Box.

9Marks Book Study Highlights: Chapter 2

Biblical Theology. The next mark of a healthy church according to Mark Dever is Biblical Theology. Why is this important you might ask? Well I think it is pretty obvious that biblical illiteracy is a huge problem in America and especially among Christians. Christians just don't read their Bible and when they do it's seldom that they come to a right understanding of the theology contained in pages they read. Part of the problem is very much related to the first mark, Expositional Preaching, or really the lack-there-of. Pastors just don't preach expositionally very often anymore and since very few of their church members actually read their Bible outside of Sunday morning it is no wonder that people have a screwed up understanding of Biblical Theology. So here are the points we learned from this chapter and hopefully you'll realize, like us, that Biblical Theology is very, very important:

• In society today, beliefs have been domesticated. People no longer fight for them and may not even care about them anymore.
• Today people believe to be true simply what they desire to be true.
• People need to have a "metanarrative" or meaning in their life.
• God is a creating, holy, faithful, loving and sovereign God.
• Sound teaching in our church must include a clear commitment to the teachings of the Bible, even if those teachings are often neglected.
• The Bible shows us very plainly that God is a creating God and the He is an electing God.
• God has a passion for holiness and is not unconcerned with His creation.
• The language of covenant is the language of personal relationship.
• The sacrifices of the OT showed that purification was needed, and that sin is so serious that death is needed to atone for it--that salvation and forgiveness are costly.
• If you think people are basically good, then a church is simply a place where we seek encouragement or perhaps the enhancement of our self-esteem.
• If you think that we are spiritually dead, then the church needs to present the Gospel clearly and tell people how to find forgiveness and new life.
• Jesus Christ was the faithful fulfillment of God's promise to redeem us into a restored relationship with Himself.
• God will continue to care for us and His continuing care is based not on our faithfulness but on His.
  

More Church Programming = More Spiritual Growth?

Here's the question: Does the spiritual maturity of a believer correlate to their level of church activity?

Some would certainly agree with that statement and come to the conclusion that those who are most active in church are the one's who are most mature in their faith...you know the the kind of people who tithe, serve, and show love for others like Christ has done unto us.

Well, Willow Creek Church, the nation's 2nd largest church, has been doing some research to see if their church model, which is highly programmatic, has been successful in producing growing disciples. If you don't know about Bill Hybels and Willow Creek he was basically the Rick Warren before there was Rick Warren. His influence on Evangelical Christianity in America has been huge and the philosophy and methods implemented at Willow Creek have shaped the way America does church in many tangible ways. I'll spare you the history lesson and get to the point: Willow Creek's research (called Reveal) concluded that what they thought was working actually wasn't.

They found that there is no significant correlation between the level of church activity and the level of spiritual growth. So basically...just because a person goes to church every time the doors are open, it doesn't mean that they are growing spiritually. Hmmm...well what about if they are involved in small groups, and go through discipleship classes, and go on trips with the youth? Still no significant correlation. So what did the research find?

Speaking at a Leadership Conference, Bill Hybels said:

"Some of the stuff that we have put millions of dollars into thinking it would really help our people grow and develop spiritually, when the data actually came back it wasn’t helping people that much. Other things that we didn’t put that much money into and didn’t put much staff against is stuff our people are crying out for."

Another author from Leadership Journal blog wrote:

"In other words, spiritual growth doesn’t happen best by becoming dependent on elaborate church programs but through the age old spiritual practices of prayer, bible reading, and relationships. And, ironically, these basic disciplines do not require multi-million dollar facilities and hundreds of staff to manage."


I encourage you to read more on this because it has some huge implications on church methodology and your own spiritual growth. Growing up in a Baptist church where programming was highly emphasized, I believe this research could have the potential to reshape the way church is done everywhere.

Check the research out yourself and leave your comments on how you think this could change the way we should "do church":

REVEAL Key Findings

Out of Ur Blog on Research

Willow: Teach People to Feed Themselves

(click to enlarge)

9Marks Book Study Highlights: Chapter 1

So far our book study on 9 Marks of a Healthy Church has been terrific. We have been challenged and stretched in the way we view ministry and the methods we use to carry it out. We have seen God affirm in us, through this book, some of the recent changes in the style/format of the Foundation services and believe we are heading in the right direction. It just so happens that one of the major changes we made in our services happens to be the the first of the 9Marks according to Mark Dever; expositional preaching. We have committed to preaching and teaching the Word of God like never before. We are deliberately making the preaching and teaching of the Word as a central part of the Foundation Ministry and trust that God will be honored by that . Check out some key ideas we gathered from Chapter 1 of 9Marks:

Chapter 1:

• The first mark of a healthy church is expositional preaching.
• The main role of any pastor is expositional preaching.
• Expositional preaching contrasts with a topical sermon.
• A topical sermon begins with what the preacher wants to preach about.
• An expositional sermon makes the point of the message the point of a particular passage of Scripture.
• A pastor who doesn’t regularly preach expositionally will never preach more than they knew when they began the whole exercise.
• Pastors shouldn’t use Scripture as an excuse for what they already want to say.
• God’s Word is the instrument chosen by Him to bring life.
• The Word shows us what to believe.
• It is in Christ that the Word of God has fully and finally come to us.
• God’s Word not only gives us life; it also gives us direction and it keeps shaping and molding us in the image of the God who is speaking to us.
• All of us, by our sinful nature, are looking for ways to justify our sins against God. We want to know how we can defend ourselves from God’s charges. Therefore we are in desperate need to hear God’s Word brought honestly to us, so that we don’t just hear what we want to hear but rather hear what God has actually said.

Joel Osteen on 60 Minutes

60 minutes has just aired a TV special on America’s most popular pastor. With a church membership of approximately 47000, Lakewood Church in Houston Texas is the largest church in America. Osteen's services are broadcasted all over the world with millions tuning in every week. And oh yeah by the way, he can bench press 300 lbs and cry on demand.

I thought the reporter did a good job, I don’t think he was buying all the stuff Osteen was yapping about. It seems like the reporter understood Christianity well enough to figure out the problem with Osteen. He kept pointing out the similarities between Osteen’s teaching and the teaching of Dr. Phil or Oprah. He also could spot the dangers in telling everyone that they will be rich and happy.

I was also glad 60 minutes brought on somebody like Michael Horton; it is very rare shows like this bring on someone of his caliber. Too bad he only got like 30 seconds of show time with 20 seconds showing him walking up stairs. But I think what they showed of Dr. Horton was good, I am surprised that they showed what they did. He was able to squeeze out a few phrases such as cotton candy gospel, fortune cookie, easy listening, and heresy. Dr. Horton is a professor at Westminster Seminary, he is also the editor of Modern Reformation magazine, and part of the White Horse Inn radio talk show.

None of this changes the fact that he is still deceiving millions with his distorted Gospel, and making millions if I might add. I am starting to think that he knows exactly what he is doing. He knows there is lots of money to be made from new age self help as well as Christianity, so why not combine them. When you need to talk about self help topics draw from your new age sources, and when you talk about something that can be supported from the Bible, use that.

The Internetmonk has a good article on the 60 minutes piece as well, so take a look at it if you can.

Extreme Makeover: A Year Following every law the Bible

Here is an interesting article about a guy who spent one year trying to follow every rule in the Bible.

John Piper: The State of the Pulpit Today

Here is an interesting video from Piper I found from the Gospel Coalition website.

It really blows my mind to see people like John Piper, who have studied and preached the truths found in the Gospel for a long time, but are still just as passionate and consumed by these truth as they were when they first learned them. It seems like each time they go to preach, they are excited by what God is teaching them through the scriptures. They do not try to preach the latest fad, they are not afraid to teach the Bible even though the surveys, and cultural experts say that is not the way to draw a crowd or reach people today. They are confident that the Gospel can change lives. We need more pastors like that, it is definitely refreshing and encouraging to see long time pastors still passionate about the Gospel.

Romans 1:16
1 Corinthians 1:18-30

Also, I just got my ESV. I think I am gonna switch over to it as my main translation. The only problem is alot of the passages I know are in the NIV. But, I really like the ESV, I have been reading and using it when I am online, so I would highly recommend at least buying a copy if you can afford it. You don't have to switch over, but it is definitely a translation I would have. Any thoughts?